High Point University men's basketball broadcaster Jason Benetti will write in on a regular basis with his thoughts and information about HPU Athletics, as well as his travels with the Triple-A Syracuse Chiefs. To send comments or questions, email panthersradio@highpoint.edu.
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Thursday, June 3, 2010
Into the Stratosphere
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On May 4th, the Chiefs and the Columbus Clippers were scheduled for an 11:05 start time in Ohio. The Clippers had a gaggle of young people coming to the park from schools, camps and all other possible locations where a gaggle of young people might come from. This was a boon for the Chiefs, too, because the team's seven-hour drive back to Central New York wouldn't be completely under the cover of nightfall.
As we neared the third inning, I looked at my cell phone. I had missed a call from both the Chiefs General Manager and a representative from the Washington Nationals' Public Relations staff. During the 90-second radio break, I called Mike Gazda of the Nationals who told me the parent club was going to announce very shortly Stephen Strasburg's promotion to Triple-A Syracuse.
Once the information was released, my inbox was drowning with requests. USA Today, the Mountain West Network and a horde of local media all sent out feelers to see what Strasburg's media availability would be. My phone was active for about 20 percent of the bus trip. At one point, I spent about 45 consecutive minutes responding to emails.
Stephen Strasburg's cultural power is, in the world of sports at this moment, unmatched. For three of his four home starts, the Chiefs drew more than 13 thousand wide-eyed viewers. The team set an all-time attendance record for itself on the day of his first start, May 7th. Some fans have been there for all of his showings. Others have driven from more than a two-hour radius to catch a fleeting glimpse of the sturdily-built 21-year-old.
What's truly amazing is that more people should want to watch him. Strasburg's fastball—pinging International League radar guns at 98 and 99 miles per hour—provides the muscle when he wants to force the batter away from the plate. His offspeed pitches—a demonic slurve which looks more like a parabola than anything else and a change-up which maintains the velocity of an average major-league fastball—transform him into a lazy ventriloquist, one that chooses never to let the puppet make a peep.
Stephen Strasburg, though, was not always this good. San Diego State's pitching coach, Rusty Filter, had to convince Tony Gwynn to take a flyer on Strasburg out of West Hills High School in Santee, California. The local boy looked, at the time scholarships were being signed and delivered, more interested in what food was on the table rather than a breaking ball that would fall off of one. Filter, though, won out and Strasburg became an Aztec. During his first semester at SDSU, Strasburg shed upwards of 30 pounds. By the time he was finished at the school, he was its most recognizable alumnus, having struck out 23 batters in one game and reached number-one draft pick status.
That is the beauty of Stephen Strasburg. In a world of 140-character bursts where few make time for self-improvement, Strasburg is a self-made phenom. Unlike Prometheus and Demeter, who derived their god-like powers in the minds of others, Strasburg came upon his current greatness through a relentless routine. That is not to say that his lore will not be exaggerated throughout the forthcoming days, months and years in Triple-A. Those that saw it will always remember the last pitch he uncorked in his first appearance in Syracuse—a dazzling curveball which made Brave farmhand Gregor Blanco seem less like a batter and more like a seven-year-old after his first look at the shark tank at the aquarium. They'll recall Strasburg's 96 mile-an-hour buzzsaw heater—again, his last pitch of the night—which paralyzed Danny Valencia of Rochester in start number three.
I'll remember the magnetic force with which Strasburg lured people to the ballpark. Locals and out-of-towners, pre-teens and senior citizens all spent their nights together to snatch a glimpse of the fluid-but-forceful 21-year-old who may just turn out to be the best pitcher of our era.
Jason
P.S. For those of you who have not been fortunate enough to see the young man throw,
here's a snippet of his first start.
Post No. 6 by Jason Benetti on Thursday, June 3, 2010.
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Thursday, April 22, 2010
The Pennsylvania Polka
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I write to you today from Allentown, Pa., where, if you believe everything you hear from Long Island-born piano men, they are in the process of shutting all of the commercial buildings in the area. That is only partially true. I have seen at least one open factory. The boarded-up Woolworths on the main drag suggests to me that the economy here has been contracting for a while, though.
I am in town as the Chiefs complete a four-game series with the Lehigh Valley IronPigs. The swine are heavy in this part of the country. Lehigh Valley is the Triple-A affiliate of the Philadelphia Phillies and has been since 2008. The home of the Pigs, Coca-Cola Park, is also three years old and has some neat amenities like a 360-degree concourse, suites behind home plate which are closer to the batter than the pitcher is and Coke which comes in containers only available at the ballpark. Your sponsorship dollars in action.
By the way, the IronPigs were named such because of the existence of a raw ore called "pig iron" in the area. When smelted down, the ore resembles a "row of piglets." Before you judge, take a gander at the other possible names: Woodchucks, Phillies, Keystones, Crushers, Gobblers, Phantastics, Vulcans. IronPigs it is (although the Vulcans could have created a nice cross-promotional tool with a famous series of movies…missed opportunity).
The most entertaining part of the trip might be the team's lodging. We stay at the Hotel Bethlehem in the historic district of the little town for which it is named. The hotel has been around for 88 years and brags about its famous guests of the days of yore. The two elevators each have a pair of picture frames on the walls depicting the visage of a former guest. So, as you ride up to your room, you can have a conversation with a portrait of JFK or, say, the Dalai Lama. Political spirituality.
The Chiefs, at the moment I write, are off to an 8-3 start thanks to some good hitting from former Texas Ranger Kevin Mench and some solid pitching from a few Nationals youngsters. Seven of the games have been decided by one run, meaning I've taken up my old habit of biting my nails. It's bad for me, I know, but the cliché says I have to do it.
In other news, the power cord on my computer died the other day while we were in Scranton. So, I called a local authorized Apple provider which I find through seven seconds of internet sleuthing. The man at this store told me my best bet was to go to Allentown. This proves my working theory: If he didn't live in Scranton, Michael Scott could be a great American.
Post No. 5 by Jason Benetti on Thursday, April 22, 2010.
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Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Car Talk
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Ten hours in the car is a rather interesting experience. By interesting, I mean mind-numbing. I woke up at 5 a.m. Sunday and was so enthusiastic about my impending travel (see also, sarcasm), that I hopped in the shower, finished packing my bags and zipped up I-81. On the radio, I started with a little Sam Cooke...his greatest hits is one of my (and Stafford's, if I can speak for him) favorites in the Benetti collection. 20+ melodies of pure soul and passion. You'd think I have a record deal with the guy or something with the hard sell I'm feeding you. I then ran through a dozen or so Police songs and followed that with a round of James Taylor. There's something odd about listening to Carolina in my Mind when you woke up in Winston-Salem and are actually outside of Hagerstown, Maryland.
After five seasons in professional baseball and college basketball, I have actually become accustomed to long rides. Accustomed in the way Panther fans are accustomed to Jake Delhomme throwing to the guys not wearing his jersey. Accustomed in the way America is accustomed to watching 48 Hours Mystery when it can't sleep.
It's no fun, especially because I left at 6 a.m. Who am I going to call at that hour? I forced myself to not even think about using my phone until 11 a.m. At that point, I called my parents to wish them a happy Easter. They didn't answer. My parents didn't answer. That's like Wilson not being at the fence for Tim Taylor. What's a man to do?
I finally got through to them, talked their ears off, talked some other ears off and, suddenly, I was in West Virginia. Home of the liberal speed limit. It's posted at 70. Not many cars with WV tags go 70, I promise.
After a quick burst through Maryland, it was off to Pennsylvania, the most vertical state in the union. I swear, I was in Pennsylvania for months. Long state, not a lot of scenery. I stopped at a gas station in Somewheresvilletown, hoping to find a warp or something. Instead, I ended up at a mini mart which required me to place a token into the bathroom door to use the facilities. In case you were wondering, I did not get a high score.
Finally, at 4 P.M., I pulled off of I-81 and arrived at my destination. Carrier Circle, Syracuse, NY. It's called Carrier Circle because it 1) contains a roundabout and 2) has a huge Carrier building just off of the roundabout. Minor issue: Carrier closed its plant. The area, I believe, should be re-named "Eyesore Interchange" or "Anachronism Loop." Both are terribly catchy, I know. I'm gonna be a heckuva headline writer one day.
Thursday is opening day for the Chiefs, the team I do play-by-play for. If you were interested in listening online, sorry. I'm not doing the opener on radio. We have a local TV deal and, so, I will be looking prettier and describing less Thursday afternoon. They've started the group makeup effort tonight. There should be time.
A few other notable things that have happened over the past few days:
-Matt Howard's mustache is offensive.
-I asked a waitress at dinner last night for fresh pepper on my salad. She, very generously, sprayed it all over the table. Now, the hostess won't seat me at a primo table at Joey's anymore because she thinks I eat like a barnyard animal.
-I rode in a police car going 85 miles an hour down Hanes Mall Boulevard, siren crying. If you think that sounds unsafe, you win.
On that last note, I wasn't arrested. I was simply observing. Promise.
Enjoy your week....talk to you Monday.
JB
Post No. 4 by Jason Benetti on Tuesday, April 6, 2010.
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Monday, March 29, 2010
Every Season Comes to an End
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This past Friday, the day after Syracuse lost to Butler in the round of 16 of the NCAA Tournament, I clicked on the homepage of the newspaper which covers the Orange. The focal point of the Post-Standard's page that morning was a picture of grief. Andy Rautins, one of Jim Boeheim's seniors, was seated in the picture. His two hands served an important role at the instant the picture was taken--they were holding up Andy Rautins's head.
Rautins's career as a collegiate basketball player came to an end that night in Salt Lake City. He'll play basketball somewhere soon enough. But, he won't play under the SU banner. And, maybe more importantly, he won't play with the group of teammates--friends, really--that surrounded him over the past half-decade. Even more importantly, he must feel like he could have changed the outcome.
Finality seizes each of the 65 teams who participate in the NCAA Tournament. Even the champions--maybe in the midst of their on-court celebration--will be visited by the specter of termination. The team that was...no longer will be. When each senior finds himself alone, he will reminisce, he will smile and he will wonder what is next. It is a time of loss and a time of gain....one that evokes some of the most basal emotions humans can exhibit.
As I sit down at my computer to write this entry, I cannot help but think of some others in my life who are experiencing something so similar yet so different.
When I was in seventh grade in Illinois, I walked into Mr. Wood's math class one morning to find a new student. His name was Eric and his family recently moved to our town from Minnesota. As the day grew, I found that Eric and I had a few classes together. We shared an interest in sports. We became friends. Eric was my statistician at the 2006 Big East Women's Basketball Tournament. I missed a pair of baseball games in the summer of 2008 to watch him get married in Chicago. For one reason or another--isn't it always that way?--we lost touch after that.
I found out this week that Eric lost his only brother, Peder, last Tuesday to cancer. Peder was 23. I woke up Thursday morning and began to click through a Facebook page which the family created in Peder's memory. Though I wasn't close to Peder, I felt overwhelming sadness for Eric. He and his brother shared just about everything--sports, faith, summers away at camp--but there should have been more. I was sad, too, that I allowed myself to drift apart from someone who I'd been friends with for about 15 years
The feeling in the pit of Andy Rautins's stomach can very crudely only approximate the one my friend Eric is experiencing right now. Each, though, on some level, wishes he could have five, ten, twenty minutes back.
Live in the moment. Share the sports you enjoy with those around you. And, please, when you finish reading this sentence, pick up the phone and call someone you haven't spoken to in a while.
Post No. 3 by Jason Benetti on Monday, March 29, 2010.
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Monday, March 22, 2010
The Eyes Have It
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It's one of those moments. A moment when the world stops and one thinks to oneself, "Finally, a chance to think." A moment to cherish. A moment to relish. A moment during which there are no cares in the world.
My email inbox is currently experiencing one of those moments. On Saturday, the Washington Nationals optioned wunder-pitcher Stephen Strasburg to Double-A Harrisburg. So, I have — for the time being — stopped receiving inquiries from the fans in Central New York about where Strasburg will begin this baseball season. As the play-by-play announcer for the Triple-A team in the Washington chain, I have been awash in a steady stream of emails asking where Strasburg will start. Strasburg, if you've been living under a rockslide, was last year's first overall draft pick in Major League Baseball. He throws nearly 100 miles per hour, commands a malevolent breaking ball, was called "our best pitcher" by Nats All-Star Ryan Zimmerman and also scored a TKO victory over Chuck Norris 102 seconds into round three the other night.
Strasburg – who played at San Diego State for one of the best hitters of all time, Tony Gwynn – is a Barnum or a Bailey away from being a full-fledged three-ring deal, here. A few weeks ago, at his first Spring Training start in Viera, Florida, the flashbulbs were relentless. The media throng was twenty to thirty deep. Though, to be fair, one of those reporters, a man with spiked hair from Taiwan, only wanted to know what Strasburg thought of his new teammate Chien-Ming Wang. Seriously.
I've wondered quite often this off-season exactly what makes someone like Stephen Strasburg so interesting. Is it his fastball? His combination of age (low) and ability (high)? That he has talent and is under contract with the Nationals?
What I realized when I was down in Spring Training was that I had it all wrong. I was examining
Strasburg's qualities – I should have been thinking about the fans. Us. The sports-viewing populace. What we want to see is something we've never seen before. With the advent of the 24-hour news cycle and its application to sports, the category of things we've never seen is shrinking. Heck, over the past weekend, we saw a team from Athens win a game, a lane violation help decide a game and a spritely point guard named Farokhmanesh with gumption the size of an Easter Island statue finish a game. All of that in this season's NCAA Tournament.
We want all of that. We want the different experiences that sports provide us. We want to watch people succeed at what they do – it inspires us to do great things, too.
We truly only are inspired to the core, though, when we see sports first hand. TV and radio are undeniably great proxies—they allow us to perceive things that we couldn't have seen nor heard otherwise. They give us the context by which we should experience the games were attend. They often come very close to putting us at the venue. But, they don't allow us to experience those things. The video highlights of Stephen Strasburg certainly made him look like the star he seems to be. Watching from row four, though, provided more. The air with which he carried himself on the mound. The unnatural, limp sound of the bat when the Tigers finally made contact. His unfazed reaction to a pair of baserunners.
Greatness is a wonderful thing. Yet-to-be-actualized greatness is even more stirring. This summer, when you're watching baseball – at Williard Stadium, in the minors, at your sixth-grader's traveling game – take note of your surroundings…and of the even fleeting stardom in front of you.
Post No. 2 by Jason Benetti on Monday, March 22, 2010.
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Monday, March 8, 2010
A (near) Disney start to the baseball season
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This is, by a country mile, the most heinous winter I've been a part of since I moved to North Carolina in '06. So, I'm doing what any weather-beaten snowbird would do: I'm going 45 minutes southeast of Disney World!
Doesn't exactly make you smile like those Super Bowl spots, I know. I'm blogging to you from Charlotte-Douglas International Airport, home of free-wifi and the silliest airline delay I've ever been a part of. A few years ago, I was on a layover in Charlotte for three hours...the layover was from Charlotte to Greensboro. I could have driven three times. I likely could have ridden a camel from the Queen City right up to Battleground Avenue in that amount of time. That day, I vowed never to book myself on any flight from Charlotte to Greensboro. Mostly because I'm terrified of camels.
But Jason, why really are you going to Florida? Well, dear reader, I'm traveling to Viera, Florida as part of my other life as the play-by-play announcer for the Syracuse Chiefs. The Chiefs are the Triple-A affiliate of the Washington Nationals. So, I'm going to be watching a lot of Nationals games over the next six days.
Come to think of it, maybe I'll just stay here. Just kidding, the Nats have stowed away some pretty good young talent and expect to have their best season since
this guy was roaming the empty halls of
this anachronistic landmark. Makes you want to speed skate, doesn't it?
What really hit me yesterday while preparing for my trip is this: Basketball season ends extremely abruptly. For the people involved--especially the coaches and players, but not excluding the support staff--basketball is life. From November (and maybe before) until March, these people are locked in. If they're not thinking about basketball for a few hours, even, they feel as though their not doing their jobs. Basketball isn't all there is, but it's most of existence.
And then, one day, the coaches and players are driving to a game. A game they believe they'll win. A game they know they'll win. Then, just a few hours later, a bus is overrun with goodbyes as luggage is dragged out of the undercarriage for the final time. Lost in all the basketball is the fact that some of these players are playing to prolong their college experience. Sure, college has a clear termination point. But, basketball-playing seniors have a hand in deciding how long their careers last. Understand, as you watch "championship week", that there's more than basketball there--it's a transition in life. It's truly strong emotion--and it's easy to identify with if you went to college and think back to your last days on campus.
Before I put down my computer and pick up a wakeboard, a word about this year's men's basketball season. 15 wins is not ideal for the coaches, the players, anyone. Scott Cherry and his staff wouldn't be truly happy with anything less than 29-0. But, the passion, energy and direction that Scott and his staff carry into the Millis Center during practice, shootaround and game nights is palpable. They will defray the credit for this season's success to the players. But, these coaches have guided this basketball program down a winning path. And they appreciate your support, I know that.
Over the offseason, I'll be blogging about happenings in HPU basketball, athletics in general and, when appropriate, ridiculous stories that emanate from traveling with a Triple-A baseball team. If you have questions, comments, qualms or queries, or if you're just bored (and there are no new
Sporcle quizzes), drop me a line at
panthersradio@highpoint.edu.
If you'll excuse me, I'm going to go ride Big Thunder Mountain.
Post No. 1 by Jason Benetti on Monday, March 8, 2010.
